ABSTRACT
By the mid-1980s, the U.S. and Canada were fi rmly set on divergent trajectories in lesbian and gay rights policy. The failure of the U.S. to enact policy changes to modernize the criminal law on homosexuality stood in contrast to the decisions made in other similar democracies over the same period, notably Britain and Canada. As the historical institutionalist approach emphasizes, the legacies of past policies shape the choices available to policymakers and political actors in contemporary debates. In the U.S., the obstacles for the lesbian and gay movement were that much greater than they were in Canada because of lack of protection for lesbians and gay men from state laws criminalizing homosexual acts. The institutional openings provided by the U.S. political system permitted evangelical organizations and gay rights opponents to organize against the passage of ordinances at the local level that provided protection from discrimination. In contrast to the Canadian model in which politically and institutionally muscular human rights commissions acted as advocates for expanded human rights protections, civil rights policies in the U.S. were more decentralized and fragmented, given the multiple obstacles to the passage of legislation in the separation of powers system.
